Чилидің Вальпараисо өңірі: Халық және этникалық құрамы

Region of Chile

The Valparaíso Region (lang es, balpaɾaˈiso) is one of Chile's 16 first order administrative divisions. With the country's second highest population of 1,790,219 as of 2017, and fourth smallest area of , the region is Chile's second most densely populated after the Santiago Metropolitan Region to the southeast.

The Valparaíso Region is populated by 1.71 million inhabitants. The population density reached 94.1 inhabitants/km2. 91.6% of the population lives in urban areas and only 8.4% of the population lives in rural areas. The most populous municipalities in the region are Valparaíso, with 308,000 inhabitants and Viña del Mar, with 287,000 inhabitants, which together with Villa Alemana, Quilpué and Concón form the Greater Valparaíso, a continuum of 1.75 million people. There are also Quillota, with about 201,000 inhabitants and San Antonio with more than 200,000 inhabitants with estimates at 250,000 to be the region's second largest city.

Valparaíso developed as a trans oceanic rest stop for fishing ships, sea cruise liners, and international naval ships. Therefore, a large proportion of residents have a variety of national origins, ethnic groups, and cultures. The 16th century colonial population was founded by male settlers from the Spanish regions of Andalusia, Asturia and León, and the large Basque contingent has given rise to a substantial Basque Chilean population. Large numbers came from other countries of Latin America from Mexico to Uruguay, esp. came during colonial rule in the 17th century. And in the late 18th–early 19th centuries came a small wave of Galician settlers from the Spanish region of Galicia. It is thought the majority of Valparaíso's people have some non Spanish European background, such as: British and Irish, Australians and New Zealanders, North Americans (U. S. or Canadian), Croats and Bosnians, Dutch and Belgians, French, Germans, Greeks, Italians, Portuguese and Scandinavians. Also, there are more or less assimilated groups of Chilean Jews (mostly Ashkenazi), as well as Christians from the Ottoman Empire, primarily Syro Lebanese and a large Palestinian community in the town of La Calera. In racial terms, the majority of Valparaíso's inhabitants are castizos, meaning that their paternal origins are overwhelmingly from white whalers, settlers and traders of various European nationalities, including colonial Spanish settlers, while their maternal origins usually stems from unions between colonial Spanish men and local indigenous women, including those of Mapuche, Inca, Aymara and North American Indian descent (transplanted Cherokees are reported to come in the late 19th century, though it could well be a myth). Smaller numbers of East Asians, mostly Chinese, Japanese or Korean, minuscule numbers of Afro Chileans, as well as a component of Polynesians whose ancestors were kidnapped from Easter Island and the Marquesas Islands, further added to the region's Hispanicized melting pot.

The Valparaíso Region is a host of agricultural lands, wine producers, and industrial activity such as copper mining and cement. Chile's largest oil refinery is located in Concón (on the mouth of the Aconcagua River and about north of Valparaíso) and there are two important copper ore refineries: the state owned Ventanas (on the coast and north of Concón) and the private works in Chagres, about inland. The region also is a hub for chemicals and gas storage near the port of Quintero. In the interior valleys, there is a booming export industry, mainly around the avocado (palta), chirimoyas and flowers. The most striking recent development has been the cultivation of hillsides using high tech drip feed irrigation. This has allowed otherwise dry and unproductive land to bear high yields.